With EIB to modernize the Palermo-Catania railway line

The Intesa Sanpaolo Imi Corporate & Investment Banking Division joins the European Investment Bank (EIB) in the project to modernise the Palermo-Catania railway line (178 km), the first of its kind in Italy in the infrastructure sector, through an innovative financial operation that will provide total resources of 3.4 billion euro.

This operation, which aims to facilitate the implementation of large-scale infrastructure projects and can become a benchmark for the implementation of green strategic infrastructure, provides:

·         800 million euro in direct financing from the EIB to the Ministry of Economy and Finance

·         a 1.3 billion euro counter-guarantee, provided by the EIB and developed in conjunction with Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane, in favour of financial intermediaries, of which the first 500 million euro has been allocated to Intesa Sanpaolo, the bank that pioneered the project by helping to outline the instrument, another 300 million euro earmarked to CDP and the remaining 500 million euro allocated to other financial intermediaries at a later stage.

The 50% counter-guarantee is backed by the InvestEU programme and enables the guarantees to be doubled to 2.6 billion euro; this, added to the financing granted to the MEF, brings the value of the resources activated to 3.4 billion euro.

The development of Sicily's infrastructure is central to the revitalisation of Southern Italy and the strengthening of the strategic role played by the Mediterranean.

Read the press release.